Michael Bayerlein

Michael Bayerlein is a doctoral researcher at the University of Kiel and a research associate at the Kiel Institute for the World Economy. Mr. Bayerlein holds a Master’s degree in Political Science and Public Internal Law from the University of Kiel as well as a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the University of Mannheim. His research interests are located at the intersection of political science and economics with a special focus on political economy, party politics, electoral behavior, globalization, and populism, with a strong focus on quantitative methods.

Michael’s dissertation is concerned with the various facets of current and historic electoral breakthroughs and rule of populist parties and politicians. His research specifically centers around the determinants and consequences of populism with a focus on identifying common causes and working out short- as well as long-term ramifications.

During his fellowship at AGI, Michael will analyze the regional differences in right-wing populist voting in Germany and the U.S. In order to do so, he introduces the concept of “spatial inequality,” which is the relative economic inequality between subnational regions. Using household income data from Germany and the U.S. on the regional revel, Michael develops a measure of relative regional inequality and models this inequality as a determinant of right-wing populist voting in both countries.

The DAAD/AGI Research Fellowship is supported by the DAAD with funds from the Federal Foreign Office.